See more of our coverage in your search results.
Foreign desk: French Lefty’s Cold Calculations
France’s ugly riots are “ostensibly about declining public services,” observes The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board — “but the presidential election next April figures into the protest calculations.” If the riots help far-left candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon “consolidate support on the left, he could be the one” to “emerge from the first round of voting to get to the two candidate runoff,” likely against National Rally’s Marine Le Pen, “leading in current presidential polls” while Mélenchon “is in a three-way tie with two candidates on the center-left. “If that sounds cynical, this is French politics.” “France is in a violent democratic funk, and it will probably get worse. Don’t think it can’t happen in the U.S. given the current state of American politics.”
From the right: Feeding the Anti-ICE Flames
“If there is a lesson to be learned” from the ICE shooting of an illegal migrant in The Bronx, “it’s that the usual critics of law enforcement will never waste an opportunity to undercut the institutions charged with keeping us safe,” warns City Journal’s Rafael Mangual. “The anger over the shooting before the conclusion of an investigation into its lawfulness is senseless” — politicians simply “seized on the shooting because they thought it could help amplify their message.” If they “really cared about the well-being of actual New Yorkers, they’d have been just as upset about the Dominican NYPD detective, Jose Mercedes, who was stabbed.” Instead, “elected progressives are once again fanning the flames.”
Libertarian: Resto Wage ‘Reform’ Backfires
After just a few years, lawmakers who ended the “tip credit” that had reduced minimum-wage requirements in restaurants are facing the “predictable, economic results,” observes Reason’s C. Jarrett Dieterle — prompting many to make “an about-face” on its elimination. In 2022, DC “repealed the tip credit and required servers to be paid the District’s full statutory minimum wage by 2027”; it soon “saw a close to 5 percent decline in full-service restaurant jobs,” while “tipped worker earnings” fell “by just under $12 million.” “Mugged by this economic reality, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser” called for walking back the credit’s elimination. After Chicago “eliminated the tip credit,” its “restaurants raised menu prices” and reduced worker hours. The “attempt to subvert basic economics” failed. The “reversals” are nods to “economic reality.”
Prison watch: Turn Inmates Into Taxpayers
Prison “is meant to get dangerous criminals off the streets,” but nearly 70% “of US prisoners are rearrested within three years after they are released,” fume Stephen Moore & John L. Evans Jr. at The Hill. Inmates “sleep, watch television and often join gangs,” when “they should be learning employable skills.” “Retention rates soar for inmates learning in prison classrooms by orders of magnitude when content is viewed on a virtual reality headset.” The Trump administration should build on the First Step Act — a “criminal justice reform bill written to promote rehabilitation” — by using this tech “for prisoners to earn a high school diploma, college degree, or certifications in electrical, plumbing and HVAC.” “Think about how much money will be saved by transforming them into employed taxpayers.”
Riots beat: From ‘Intersectionality’ to Insanity
“It’s the Revolution. We’re taking the Bastille,” shouted protesters “as they broke into Marseille’s city hall in France on Saturday,” notes Simone Rodan-Bezanquen at The Free Press. “Carrying a Palestinian flag, they overturned furniture and knocked a bust of Marianne, the symbol of the French Republic, to the floor.” Yet what “does the mayor of Marseille have to do with Gaza? How does storming his offices help a French student get a teacher?” For activists “joining these causes together, these questions barely arise.” “This is what intersectionality has come to mean”: “Sort the world into oppressors and oppressed, then take sides. A French principal, a police officer, and Israel can end up in the same camp without anyone having to explain much about the similarities between them.”
— Compiled by The Post Editorial Board